Dear Aunt Millie ...
One young man’s cry for help in a nebulous yet entirely fictional situation that in no way, whatsoever, reflects the realities of the world we live in today.
Dear Aunt Millie
Written in collaboration with Bryan Pirolli of Love and Other Fictions
Dear Aunt Millie,
I don’t even know what to do with Mom anymore. I know you’d understand more than anyone. But I’m trying to be a good son. Hopefully I’m also a good enough nephew and you can throw me a bone here. Seriously, anything. I’ll take it.
I called her a few weeks ago and she rushed me off the line like the curtains were on fire. I went over to the house last weekend to check if she burned the place down. I heard the voices before I knocked. They got quiet real fast.
She was doing it again. With them. When she opened the door, she gave me that look, that incredulous face of a child caught with a hand in the cookie jar. But that surprise flipped through a thousand iterations like the old flap board at Gare du Nord station before she settled on resolve. The same resolve she had in her eyes when the water bugs appeared in the early summer, when we’d come back from our last day of school and the corpses would be piled up in the dustpan while Mom was smoking a celebratory Pall Mall on the porch. But she’s not messing with water bugs anymore. This is serious. Have you seen the headlines or watched the news lately?
Now I just don’t know what to do to fix this, and you know I’m not the kind to ask for help. I’m scared. Not of her, but for her. I’m panning the stream here hoping for a tiny nugget, just one glimmer of hope that you have an idea of what to do.
Your nephew,
Kurt
~~~~
Dear Kurt,
I am not surprised to hear that your mother is at it again—or should I say “still”? I find it funny that you think your old aunt still has even a shred of hope about anything, these days, let alone about Grace! You may be seriously over-estimating me, my boy. “Hopeful” is no longer in my repertoire of emotions, ever since your ex-uncle Bruce ran off with that Wanda—but that is another story. Ha ha ha.
Anyway, seriously, I’ve been dealing with my sister for over 40 years and still don’t know how to respond to her imprudence. She’s always so stubbornly sure about her “causes”. She’s always had a powerful social conscience and doesn’t mind playing with fire. It seems she can never admit to the horrendous trouble she could get into, especially these days!
I want you to know I share your fears, Kurt, and I will try to help you and Grace out in any way I can. I care about you, and I take your concerns very seriously—well, you know, as serious as your Aunt Millie can be. I hope I can come up with some good advice for you about your mom, but you may be giving me too much credit. Just tell me exactly what she is into and why you are scared, my darling boy.
I miss your face and I wish we could get together in person. You are so far away. But I do know you like to write and that is fine with me, so keep me up to date with this latest drama. We will work on it together.
Your loving Aunt
Millie
~~~~
Dear Aunt Millie,
"I took a casserole over to Mom’s house today and found her trying to teach them ways to be less conspicuous in public places, to blend in with all the other people as if they come down from Mars or something. Cotillion lessons for Martians. Well, for those with targets on their backs by no fault of their own. Mom had some good ideas."
The house was full of those people. I don’t say it to belittle them. I respect them, I do, but I’d rather not commit anything to paper that could get me in trouble. I’d like to think I didn’t inherit Mom’s recklessness.
The way they looked at me made me fear something deep down, not from them of course, but about them. Something they attract. Something that orbited them without them ever asking, asking just about as much permission as the Moon asked to loop the Earth. Mom chased me out, said she had work to do. She said they didn’t like the cheese I used in the casserole! She had such a crazed, excited look in her eyes. I knew it was passion, but funny how passion and insanity would almost completely overlap when put into a Venn diagram.
In a perfect world, I’d give the woman a medal, but you know, Aunt Millie, we’re not living in anything akin to perfection. Far from it. She thinks she can change that, but can she? Has she ever changed a thing?
Love,
Kurt
~~~~
Dear Kurt,
That mother of yours! Does she even listen to you? How involved are you?
Gracie has always created so much drama in her life. Did you know that she dragged me into one of her causes in middle school to take a stand against bullying? We were called to the vice-principal’s office so many times. She ended up in Urgent Care with with a broken finger before she realized it was too big a problem for us to tackle alone and no one else was willing to step up! She was so pissed off.
Then, for a whole year she was madly volunteering down at the dog rescue shelter every day after school. She put in so much time her grades dropped like a stone. I wanted to help her out, I really did. It was a good project, but I didn’t get into it as much as she did—my grades were already low enough, God knows!
And then later—you remember? She volunteered to teach English to those field workers out in the camps in Salinas. She was always telling me how La Migra was snooping around every week picking up undocumented workers. She actually stood outside the classroom door wielding a shovel (!) refusing to let the Federal agents enter the room. At that time, they couldn’t legally enter and she knew it. Then the field bosses canceled the classes to keep the trouble away.
I worry, you know, because I see how the political circus has morphed over the last few years, It is like we are reverting to the 1960s! The Feds are cracking down more and more on any group or any person who might be “different”, any people that do not suit their agenda.
It is outrageous, how they, themselves, create a problem and then insist they have to take drastic action—to the point of mandating curfews or calling in the National Guard. It is absolutely nuts!! You just have to wonder who is really in charge back there...
I have so many questions and I need to know what I can do to help where you are. Do be careful, dear Kurt!
Love,
Aunt Millie
~~~~
Dear Aunt Millie,
I went over to bring mom another casserole, this time no cheese. Mom was happy to share it but then she told me that someone knocked on the door the other day. Left a set of Polaroids on the porch, stuck onto the wood with an old steak knife put through them. Mom said she wasn’t rattled, but I knew she was. I know I am. But she said progress doesn’t stop because of a flat tire. I asked if it stopped for a slit throat. She didn’t answer.
I tried cleaning up the place when they started filing in again. What a mess! Newspapers and books everywhere — financial literacy for dummies. U.S. history, social theory. The kind of books you need to train an army of well-informed citizens—you know, exactly the kind of people that the system seems to be silencing. They all started talking together while Mom shooed me out of the house. She’s taking it too far. There are receipts now. Paper receipts. I’m afraid of what will happen if they start hearing about this.
Yes, they, those other people, you know damn well whom I’m talking about. Those who shall not be named. Those who might be callous enough to stab a few Polaroids. I wish Mom would stop worrying about those people in the house, and start worrying about those other people who might storm in uninvited. Call me selfish, but really I wish she’d just think about us. Me. You. The family. Whatever will we do?
Fretfully yours,
Kurt
~~~~
Kurt!
What is going on? I have called so many times and you don’t pick up! I don’t know how to get hold of you, and I am really worried, honey. And not just about whether they liked your casserole!
The news on the television made my heart sink thinking about what might be happening to you and your mom down there, because I know if they can do this to those people, they can do it to you, to me, to anyone.
I have been working down at the local precinct every evening making calls to voters, prepping mailers, even going door to door trying to raise awareness and register new voters. I send letters and emails to my state and federal congressmen every day, but it feels like it’s not enough.
It is really hard for me to leave my work, but I will damned well do it, Kurt, to come find you and work along side you and your mom. Gracie has always been braver than me, but I still have fight in me, you know. You’d be surprised!
Call me, damn it!
Aunt Millie
~~~~
Kurt!
Where are you? I am just worried sick and you haven’t replied to my letter or calls. I am following the news closely about the insane actions taken by Washington in the name of “peace-keeping”. Denver, Chicago and Portland. And now in Philly and DC? Los Angeles must be a total mess. Where will it end? I saw footage of people being dragged off the street, families separated.
Fire hoses and gas being used to disperse peaceful demonstrations. And what about the detention centers—where are they?
People around me now are no longer just shrugging and saying “Nothing can be done!” People are becoming mobile, trying to take action—like Grace has always done—she was and is always willing to take a stand, break a bone or two. And you too, my brave boy. Please, honey, contact me. I will come wherever you are.
Aunt Millie
~~~~
Aunt Millie,
We’re alright. Relatively. Sorry for the scare! This is what’s happened. I was at mom’s house with another casserole, vegan this time, when they came — the other people. It was a surprise. They didn’t identify themselves, bandanas around their faces like you’ve been seeing on the TV I bet. It was just after the big news in Philly and Denver. Anyway, the suburbs weren’t spared either. They put all the people sitting at our kitchen table in vans, unmarked. Trampled all over those books. Treated us all like we were about to hijack a plane or use the incorrect bathroom or something. I just didn’t have time to call.
We were detained and brought here to Louisiana. Not sure where, exactly. I made friends with one guard — a “friend of the family,” ya know? Cute guy, bad situation. He said the pay’s good and his dad’s sick, and it was either be a guard here or face something worse. He agreed to send this letter on the condition there's no return address. Afraid you can’t contact me or send me a care package any time soon.
They keep saying we know what our crime was, but can’t name it themselves. Mom’s nearby. They didn’t break her. She still cracks jokes with others, doing what she can. I’m so proud of her. She’s angry as all hell and livid that she put us in this position, but proud. Call it either passion or insanity, but it’s admirable. She stared the monster in the eye and dared it to gobble it up. And gobble it did, but we’re keeping spirits up from inside its gut, waiting for it to spit us back out, if we don’t chop our way out from the inside first.
As luck would have it, I broke a finger while struggling as they cuffed me during the raid. Mom smiled and said that you always pay a cost when you fight a bully. I’m just glad I have nine more fingers to add to the fight.
Your loving warrior,
Kurt
Thank you, Bryan Pirolli at Love and Other Fictions , for inviting me to speak for Aunt Millie in this story. It was a pleasure working with you!
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This goes so deeply into my being. I thought about my learners up in Truckee and where they might be. Did they return to Mexico? They had homes and businesses here, but ....... Oddly, when you mentioned the 60s, I thought of Edwar dAbbey's The Lonely Cowboy. It told of how Korean vets were often arrested just for hanging around on the street. Loitering was a crime then. Freedom? It's never really existed in the Land of the Free Home of the Brave. I'm glad this story is posted on Substack and I will restack it. A ballsy story indeed.
The migrants! The asparagus. The center of Michigan was the Asparagus Capitol of the U.S.--until now. Now it comes from Peru! What? I just don't get it, but it's happening! And it's real.
This post with two voices is precious. I love hearing from voices who are DIFFERENT. It is refreshing and wholesome.
As tomorrow I head to Canada.
Well, let's see what happens there...